Disease
by AngelMeroko
Summary: Setting: 2 years after Taihi incident. MAwata has drifted away... AGAIN! Her best friend Mannen is the only one she can confide in.But she hasnt talk much in 1 and a half years. He tries to talk to her... First chapter re-spaced
1. The beginning after the end

**Disclaimer: I do NOT own any of the characters mentioned in this ****fic****, nor do I own the characters NOT mentioned in this ****fic****NOW ON TO THE FIC!**

Mawata sat on the edge of her bed. It had been almost 2 years since the incident with Taiji Fenrir. But now Takako was back to normal, and she and Sasame were united at last.

That was just fine with Mawata, she was officially over Sasame, and she now had her new best friend Mannen to confide in. However, her life had grown more complicated when she realized that she was falling for her best friend.

She couldn't help it. He was so handsome, nice and understanding with a touch of childishness, though kind of troubled.

When the TaiJi incident was over she spent time with all the knights equally. But after a while the person she talked to the most was Mannen.

They had grown very close. But now that Mawata was falling for him, he was all that she could think about We all know how obsessive Mawata is…).

Then she found out that she had Leukemia. When she found out that she only had 2 more years to live.

She tried to make the best of it, but then, 6 months later, she began to fall away from everyone.

Even Mannen and she fell into a depression, once again. Not as big as before, and not big enough for anyone to notice.

That is, except for Mannen. He noticed that she had stopped smiling again, and she didn't talk to him as much as she used too, this worried him.

He was beginning to think that she did not want to talk to him anymore. The very thought, crushed him, for she had been his secret crush for a long time. Then, a year later she stopped talking to everyone, but him, and she only talked to him a little bit.

She had been starting to look a bit pale lately too. Mannen had asked her, on many occasions what was wrong, but she never told him.

She was in her room a lot now as well. One night, Mannen made a path of ice and went up to her bedroom window. She glanced over at the wall where her clock was, Midnight.

She was writing in her diary. But as soon as she was done she walked over to the window, and opened it, for some fresh air.

When she saw Mannen in the window, she nearly screamed. But Mannen put a finger to her lips, winked, grinned and shook his head. She helped the 15 year-old Ice Knight Climb in the window, she gripped his hand.

The second his hand touched her she felt a chill run through her whole body, as his hand was as cold as ice.

"You know, Kei is going to kill you if he finds you here." Mawata said, sitting down on the large window sill. Before she had found out her Leukemia, she had talked to each knight equally, except Mannen, she talked to him more than the others.

But she knew Kei Well enough that if Mannen was caught up in her room at _night_, he would kill Mannen. She laughed slightly at Mannen's expression as Mannen recalled the memory of Kei telling him that if he ever went into any girl's room at night he would be hurt, badly.

He rubbed the back of his neck and laughed nervously.

"Aw, I don't care, anyways... I wanted to talk to you Mawata." He said with now serious expression.

Mawata shifted nervously in her seat.

Mannen sat down next to her.

"Is something wrong Mawata-chan?" He asked staring into her aqua eyes.

'No, nothing is wrong.' She thought, 'I must not let him worry about me. I don't want to be a bother to my family and friends...'

She put on a fake cheerful smile and said, "No, of course not Mannen, Why would anything be the matter?" she answered in a sickeningly fake cheerful voice.

Mannen raised one eyebrow at her, and she practically melted. She loved it when he did that...

"Really Mawata, What's wrong? You can tell me... you can trust me... can't you?" he asked.

There was such a look or pain and suffering in his eyes that her eyes welled up with long lost tears. She began to cry but caught herself and tried to make it stop.

She put her hands up to stop the tears from falling, but stopped as Mannen's strong cold hands grabbed hers.

"It's okay Mawata...let it out. Just let it all out..." he said quietly, watching her intently.

Mawata looked into his deep brown, caring eyes. They were filled with concern for her... She squinted slightly, brow furrowed. Her hands started shaking, then her arms.

Her hands balled into fists and her whole body began to shake dangerously. She sniffled a few times, and buried her face in Mannen's shoulder and began crying, sobbing. She cried the tears of 16 years, of trying to be strong and never crying. But now she let it all out.

She cried for 3 hours. The whole time Mannen patted her back saying, "It's okay Mawata... I am here for you..."

When she was finally finished crying she lifted her head up and looked at Mannen. She knew she must have looked a mess. She glanced at the clock, 3:11 am. Then she looked into her mirror.

She saw her flushed, red face and blood shot eyes, and she covered her face with her hands. Mannen took her hands in his own and said, "It's okay Mawata... you look beautiful."

Mawata just sat still where she was. Then a few seconds later she looked up.

"I do?" she asked faintly.

"Yes." He answered grinning. "Now," he said seriously again. "What is wrong?"

She looked away again, her eyes watching the floor.

Pain filled his eyes again.

"Why can't you tell me?" he asked.

She looked up at him, and then looked back down at the floor, not wanting to see his face when she told him...

"I have Leukemia..."

**A/N: ****Soooo**** how is it? Got any comments please R&R!**


	2. Reaction

A/N: I am not sure if convulsing happens with Leukemia victims, but it does for the sake of this story

A/N: I am not sure if convulsing happens with Leukemia victims, but it does for the sake of this story.

There were several moments of silence and Mannen registered what she said. Then he grinned.

"Oh come on Mawata...your joking...aren't you?" he asked. When he saw the she wasn't, his grin disappeared and his jaw started to shake.

Mawata turned her back to him. She put her head in her hands and her shoulders drooped and she began to sob again.

Mannen grabbed her shoulders and turned her back to him and he squeezed her shoulders for a few seconds then loosened his grip. He pulled her into an embrace and they stood there like that for a few more minutes. Then he finally pulled away. Mawata's face was still in her hands.

"Mawata, it is okay. We will get through this."

Mawata looked up at him and stopped crying long enough to say, "B-but it is f-fatal. I have only six months..."

Mannen's heart dropped.

"You only have six... six months? That is all?" he whispered.

Mawata nodded and began to cry again but caught herself.

"How long have you had it?"

"One and a half years..."

"One and a half years, and you haven't told anyone?!" Mannen gasped. "Why not?"

"Because... because I didn't want to burden other people with my problems. Everyone had been so happy and I am already enough of a burden to everyone."

"A burden…? You think you're a burden? To who?" he asked.

"Everyone." she answered

"Even me?" he said.

"Especially you!" she cried turning her head to the side.

"W-wait, what makes you think you are a burden to me?"

She turned away and was silent for the next few minutes.

"Please, just leave me be."

"But-"Mannen started.

"Please, if you are caught up here, you will get in big trouble." She whispered.

Mannen sighed, "Okay then... I will see you tomorrow."

"Okay... and please, don't tell anyone." Mawata pleaded.

"Okay, but you have to tell someone." Mannen replied

"I told you, didn't I?" she answered

"Yeah…" Mannen said, not being able to think of anything to say.

"Then I told someone, now go. I think I hear someone coming." She quickly lied.

Mannen jumped out of the window and made the ice bridge disappear, leaving Mawata alone with her thoughts.

Mawata walked quickly over to the window and watched as Mannen ran off.

She looked at the ground as his figure vanished into the darkness. She walked steadily to her vanity and began to brush her hair as she did every night before she went to sleep...and every morning when she got up.

After 100 strokes, she looked at the brush with a sad expression. She slowly pulled all the hair out of the brush. She had begun losing some hair, but she tried not to let it get her down. When she was done, she threw the hair in the trash and climbed in bed. She was really tired, yet she couldn't sleep.

She couldn't stop thinking of Mannen, how kind he was to her. She couldn't help but feel safe when she was around him, even with her current predicament...

Her heart felt cold as she turned on her side. Her eyes went out of focus and she began to cough violently.

Mannen ran to a small area in the garden. His own tears falling out of his eyes and down his cheeks... He wiped his cheeks, annoyed at his tears.

"Kusou!" he yelled. "Onegai Kami-sama, Omaiwa no tasukete!(Damn it! Please God, help me!)"

He fell to his knees and punched the ground. He sent waves of ice over the bushes and flowers. Just then he felt something weird, like a twinge in his heart.

"What...? Mawata...Mawata-chan!" he yelled, jumping back up and running to the mansion.

He made a bridge of ice once more and ran up to her window. He jumped in and looked around for her. He looked at her bed and heard loud desperate coughs.

"Mawata..." he whispered. He ran over to her and saw her pale, sweaty face, the coughing was making her eyes tear up until tears were running down her face. "Mawata, I will go get Himeno." He said as he slowly began to back away.

Mawata managed to shake her head. Though the motion caused her great pain, and she curled up into a ball, coughing even more violently.

"Mawata, this is serious!" Mannen all but yelled.

A few seconds later, she stopped coughing and shakily sat up.

"I-I'm fine..." she whispered, her voice even more faint than normal because of the strain of the coughing.

"No, no Mawata, you're _not_ fine, you are seriously sick. But if we take you to a doctor we might be able to cure you!" Mannen said urgently. "How long has this going on for?"

"The coughing fits normally lasts only five minutes." Mawata whispered, clutching her throat as she coughed once more, much more gently than before.

"Mawata, as a knight to the Pretear, I am obligated to uphold her wishes...and her wishes are that we, the Knight's protect her family. Of which you are a part of." Mannen said with a sly smile. "So I suppose that means I must take care of you and stay here tonight to make sure nothing else happens." He said trying to lift the mood, if only a little.

"Okay, It might be nice to not be alone..." Mawata consented, with a yawn.

"Mannen began to get up, but stopped when he heard Mawata say, "Mannen, please don't leave me."

Mannen smiled and replied.

"I won't."

He grabbed a chair sitting a few feet away and sat down.

_Good, she is finally asleep..._ Mannen thought.

Mannen began to stand, but he bumped the chair and it made a shrill squeaking sound. Mawata's nose crinkled. He grinned a bit and sat back down. A few minutes later he reached over to take her hand, but jumped when a small shock went through him.

"Static electricity…?" he whispered, as he dropped her hand.

He leaned back in his chair, thinking about Mawata.

He looked back down at her, and took her hand again. He eyed the window, and cringed when eh thought of the wrath of Goh that he would face if found in her room. He looked back down at Mawata's peaceful sleeping face and made a silent oath.

'I will save you from this Mawata, I promise you.'

"Hey Himeno, have you seen Mannen?" Sasame asked as he passed Himeno in the hall.

"Um... No, not today. I was wondering why it was so quiet." Himeno said with a grin. "I will keep an eye out for him though, if you want."

"Sure, thanks. I need to speak with him. Kei, Goh and I are rounding up the Knights."

"Oh really, what's going on?"

"It is just a meeting." Sasame replied.

"Do you need me there?" Himeno asked, slightly hopefully.

"Um... no, sorry Himeno, it is a knight thing." Sasame said in an apologetic voice.

"Oh...okay then, see you later." Himeno said in a slightly put out voice.

"Bye." Sasame said, as he continued his search for the young Ice knight.

Coincidentally he miscalculated where he was and instead of going into the 3rd floor art parlor, he went into Mawata's room.

At first he was taken aback when he saw the vanity. And as he was turning to leave, he saw Mannen. He raised an eyebrow and walked over to where Mannen was. His eyes widened as he saw that Mannen was not only in a girls room alone with her... but he was sitting beside her bed! Given he was sitting in a chair next to the bed, fast asleep, with his head on her bed.

He walked over to Mannen and was about to wake him up before Goh for some unknown reason, somehow found them... However he was too late because the authoress is feeling mean right about now.

Right before Sasame got to Mannen the door burst open and in came Goh and Kei.

"Sasame, why the heck did you come into Mawata's room?" Goh yelled. Then he looked at the bed and saw that Mawata was asleep...well, used to be asleep.

But in noticing this, he also noticed that Mannen, who is a very sound sleeper, was asleep in a chair next to her bed with his head resting on the mattress. . His eyes went out of focus...it was the calm before the storm.

There was a few moments of complete silence before Goh 'calmly' walked over to Mannen, his eyebrow twitching. He raised his hand up, balled into a fist and brought it down on Mannen's head extremely hard.

Mannen yelped and jumped up, the chair falling to the ground behind him. He was holding his head.

"Owww..." he whimpered.

"You stupid brat, have I not taught you anything?!" Goh yelled. "Why are you in Mawata's room, _alone_ with her, and sleeping next to her bed?! I ought to beat the crap out of you! And _further more_-" But Goh's rant was cut short as Kei interrupted.

"Um, Goh. Maybe, just maybe we should wait to lecture him and go round up the rest of the knights for the meeting."

At that comment Goh agreed, while Mannen's eyes clouded, in thought.

"Plus, Mawata is in here..."

Goh looked at Mawata, who was stifling a giggle. His face turned beet red.

"Ah, sorry Mawata-chan! We'll just be...going now. Bye, bye!" Goh said, still blushing.

"Okay... go easy on him though, Goh. He was just comforting me last night and fell asleep." Mawata said.

"Uh, okay..." Goh murmured.

"Lets go." Kei said.

The 4 knights said their good-bye's and took their leave.

"I have some news." Mannen said seriously as they walked toward the 1st art parlor in search of Hayate, Hajime and Shin.

"Well, you can tell us at the meeting." Goh said, still upset and embarrassed.

They continued on in silence. When they finally got to the parlor they found the other 3 knights and went outside to the portal to Leafenia.

A/N: Hey, sorry about the long waiting! I haven't really been writing anything at all. I am currently re-doing the chapters and writing an additional one, so please review… even if you hate me now because I haven't been updating D

Meroko


	3. New Pretear?

**A/N: Just making sure everyone remembers, the ages for the younger Knights are up a few years. So since Mannen was 10 in the anime, but in this story, it took place when he was 13(for the sake of the story). So now it is 2 years later, so he is 15. This only applies to the three younger Knights and Mawata. Mawata was 15 at the time of the incident and she is now 17. Thank you, enjoy!**

**####  
**

Hayate was pacing in Leafenia by the pond. He stopped pacing for a moment, and looked into the pond. This was the place where they had imprisoned Taiji Fenrir who was also known as Takako. She and Sasame had been living happily since the evilness within her had been dispersed. They had been married right after Himeno was found to be alive. Sasame had retained his Leafe Knight abilities when they had repaired his earring.

This pond was also the reason he met Himeno. Hayate felt a pang in his chest at the thought of her. He had thought her to be the most annoying person ever when he had met her, but she had turned out to be the love of his life. His eyes clouded as he turned from the pond and he began pacing. Thinking of her right now was proving to be painful. A moment later the portal opened from the Earth and the rest of the Knights appeared. Takako chose that moment to come out of the house which they had built for her and Sasame. She walked to Sasame and hugged him, staying by his side, with an arm around him, and his arm around her.

"So what is this meeting about Hayate?" Kei asked, looking questioningly at Hayate.

"Hayate-nii, why isn't Himeno-nee here?" Shin asked. He was now 9 years old and more aware of everything that was going on than he was in the battle.

"Because we need to have a meeting about… problems that she can't help with, and we don't want her to get upset that she can't do anything about it." Hayate tried to explain to the boy. He didn't really lie, but he did need to get on with this meeting.

"Okay… we have a matter of high importance to talk about today." He started out, capturing the attention of the knights(and Takako). "Something has come to my attention… It's about Himeno."

"What's wrong with Himeno-nee?" Hajime asked, worriedly.

"I believe that… She has lost her ability to become Prêtear." Hayate said with a hint of embarrassment. For some reason it was harder to fathom when he said it aloud.

There was a moment of silence and all of the Knights began talking at once, except Mannen who stood, staring thoughtfully at the ground.

"What does this mean?"

"Hayate, what did you do…"

"What if something happens and there is no Prêtear to protect the Earth?"

"Are we going to need to find a new one?"

Finally, Hayate cut them off. "I fear we may need a new Prêtear soon… There have been signs that a new evil is approaching." Hayate said, trying to changed the subject to something other than why she could no longer prêt. He looked over at Sasame, who was staring intently anywhere that he could avoid the eyes of the Knights. "Sasame, I am pretty sure that you have been able to tell… that you can feel it."

Sasame shifted his gaze from the side of the small house to Hayate.

"Yes, I have been able to feel something, however, I have not been able to tell if it is nefarious or not."

Goh walked behind Sasame and smacked him in the head.

"You idiot!" He yelled. "Why didn't you tell anyone? You know that we need to be careful about new threats." He seethed, steam seemingly coming out of his ears.

Sasame grimaced slightly and stepped away from him. "I know that… However, I did not want to spook everyone if it was nothing." Sasame explained, using the soothing quality in his voice to ease Goh's anger. It had apparently worked, as his face had gone from purple to his normal tone.

"Okay, so what are we supposed to do about this?" Kei asked Hayate, obviously expecting an answer from him.

"Well, we are going to need to find the new Prêtear, obviously." Hayate said, somewhat irritated. It was somewhat rare to see Hayate upset since he and Himeno had realized each other's feelings and started going out.

"So we are going to start from scratch? What about Himeno-nee?" Hajime asked, obviously concerned about the fate of Himeno, who he thought of as a big sister.

"Himeno hasn't realized it yet. However, if we were to start searching for the new Prêtear without letting her know what has happened, I would not want to be around her for a while." Hayate said, grimacing. "I will tell her soon. However, we need to divide up into groups to search-"

"I know who the new Prêtear is." Mannen said, finally speaking up. All at once, every voice speaking died down and all eyes turned to him.

"You do?" Hayate asked with hard eyes. "Who?"

"It's… I think it's Mawata." He said, his eyes just as hard as Hayate's as he stared back.

"How do you know?" Kei asked.

"How do we ever know?" Mannen asked irritably. "I touched her hand and I felt the sho-"

"You were trying to hold her _hand_?" Goh asked incredulously. Mannen rolled his eyes.

"That's _not_ the point Goh!" Mannen said, "But I really do think that Mawata is the next Prêtear."

Hayate gave Mannen a thoughtful look. "We'll see about that. We better get going back to Earth, before Himeno suspects anything."

"Um… Hayate, I think it is already too late for that." Sasame said apologetically, thinking of his encounter with Himeno in the hall way.

**####**

Himeno had been wandering around the garden since the Knights had left. She let out a rather loud sigh and walked a bit with her eyes closed. When she opened them, she was at the spot where she had first met the Knights, excluding Hayate whom she had met before that.

She giggled a bit as she remembered her first meeting with Hayate. She went to sit on the bench she had just fallen off of when Sasame spoke to her from over head. She had fought her first battle in this very garden.

A moment later, the portal from Leafenia opened and the Knights came through. Hayate was the first to spot her. He motioned to the other Knights, and Takako (who had been strangely silent through the meeting) to leave them.

"What's going on Hayate?" Himeno asked, a slight hint of fear in her eyes at the sight of his grim face.

"Himeno, take my hand." Hayate said, extending his hand out to her.

Hayate, what is this all about?" Himeno asked, laughing hesitantly.

"Just take my hand."

Himeno reluctantly took his hand, anticipating the transformation. When nothing happened, she looked at Hayate, alarmed. Hayate, however, did not look surprised and even looked slightly scared. He pulled her into a hug and rested a hand on her abdomen.

"Himeno… You're pregnant." Hayate said, somewhat meekly.

Himeno's face went completely red in seconds.

"P-pregnant?" Himeno stuttered. "But…" Her face went even redder (if possible). "What will we say to my dad? And how does that keep me from being Prêtear?" She asked frantically.

"It seems that a Prêtear must be a virgin." Hayate said, his face becoming redder as well. "We hadn't known this before, because we had never had the same… er… circumstances."

"So what are you going to do about a Prêtear?" Himeno asked Hayate.

"Well, we think we already found the new one…"

**####**

**A/N: There you have it, the new chapter three! I will try to get a chapter four out soon!**

**Meroko**


End file.
